Holding court at the centre of a long table, Seal started off with a solemn, passionate speech on the cruel rise of imperialism in India, before transitioning to the national movements that were inherited from it. 

“Every country has to have an enemy,” said Seal. “Jinnah didn’t even know the Quran. I remember as a child, him coming to our house saying he had a bad day and needed a glass of whiskey.” 

Imperialism and politics

Anil Seal, a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, initially downplayed the impact of imperialism before proceeding to analyse its mechanisms.

He claimed there was one thing in common between the apologists and critics of imperialism—they both exaggerate its omnipotence. 

“Imperialism’s power to do bad, we’ve all heard about. Steal, rob, loot, rape—yes,” said Seal. “But to fundamentally reshape society—no.”  

He went on to explain how the British Empire, formed for “profit, power and prestige”, thrived in India. 

“The rule or dominance of the alien few over the indigenous many depends on the collaboration with people in whose interests it is to work with the British Raj,” said Seal. 

He was referring to princely states, prominent businessmen and landowners of the time, who decided to align with the British for their self-interest. 

Even neutrality, the keeping quiet of the many, helped solidify Britain’s chokehold on the Indian subcontinent.   

“If all of you, during the freedom movement, stood together and I said “spit”, you could have drowned the 3,000 British ruling India in a sea of phlegm,” said Seal, soliciting laughs from the audience. 

“There are more British running Cambridge University’s student body of 12,000 today than those governing colonial India in the 1900s,” he said, underscoring this point. 

Hindu College students, many of whom were Indian Administrative Services (IAS) aspirants, furiously took down notes as Seal expounded on just how the British maintained the neutrality of India’s population. 

First, they kept places localised and unconnected. “They didn’t rock the boat,” said Seal. “They left people sitting on their own thrones, whipping their own dogs.” 

And finally, to extract power and profit, the British could not govern a hundred different localities. Instead, they strengthened the chain of command from the district level, through provinces all the way back to their homeland. 

“That is why the British built all these roads, railways and telegraphs. Not for the benefit of the people, but to strengthen the centralised state,” said Seal,  emphatically slapping the table to drive home his point. 

Partition propaganda 

The British Empire’s decline, spread over nearly half a century, was caused by both international forces and internal pressure. 

During this time, pushback from national movements picked up, and India’s political movement employed a dual strategy, according to Seal.

“Agitation and constitutionalism are often put as choices. But they were two tactical sides to the same coin,” he said, before adding that non-cooperation, civil disobedience and the “Quit India” movement were not opposing forces to constitutional politics.

However, according to Seal, Indian politics until Independence and even after, have not been mass movements.

“The idea that Britain was driven out of India by mass movements is wrong,” he commented. “We are still waiting for a mass movement that energises the base of the pyramid.”

His focus shifted briefly to contemporary India, where he commented that even the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and INDIA are a khichdi (mixture) of many different elements. To him, the broader an alliance’s base, the weaker its ideology becomes.

But it was the big question of the night—who was responsible for the Partition—that elicited an emotional response from Seal. He questioned whether the horrors, bloodshed, loss of lives and property could have been avoided.

“I am going against all the present things you are fed in films, propaganda,” said Seal. He also joked with the audience that they all may have to accompany him to jail for being “anti-national”.

“It was not what Jinnah had spent his life fighting for,” said Seal, absolving Jinnah of responsibility for the Partition. “It wasn’t even the Brits in the end game.”

According to him, Britain was bankrupt at this time. “Mountbatten was ready to lay anything on the table, including his wife, to get out of India quickly.”

It was the Congress high command who demanded Partition, afraid of the power from Muslim-dominated states that would challenge the central government, he insisted.

“The great prize for which every nationalist movement has been fighting is to inherit the one real legacy of imperial rule—the mechanism of a centralised state,” said Seal, arguing that this is what the Congress wanted, and what the BJP is striving for today.

He said it suits India’s political and national narrative to blame the Partition on Jinnah, which has fueled animosity toward Pakistan to this day.

“Change it. Challenge it. Look at the truth”, said Seal. – The Print, 3 March 2025

› Udit Hinduja is a journalist in New Delhi.